Like the owners of cinemas around the world, Brandon Jones is excited to see fans queue To buy tickets to watch a Minecraft movie, the first great success in a year of the other discouraging for the industry.
But His emotion is permeated with anxiety Thinking about what could happen in The New Canaan Playhousehis carefully restored cinema and a century old in Connecticut, when the public listens to the actor Jack Black shout “Chickn Jockey”
This phrase, like any teenager with a Tiktok account can tell you, has become the excuse So that Minecraft fans stand up, shout, launch their buckets full of popcorn, throw their soft drinks and, at least one occasion, lift a live chicken through the air. Even in some United States cinemas (EU) Police were already called.
“They have thrown us popcorn, we have thrown soft drinks,” says Jones, a little worried about possible damage to the upholstery. “We have luxurious and really very beautiful armchairs.”
Jones’ staff began to enter the movie theater just before the scene of the “Chickn Jockey”, What seems to contain chaos. “We want people to have fun, but we don’t want them to be destructive.”says. “They shout, applaud and throw some popcorn, but do not ruin it to others.”
The movie of Minecraftwhich premiered on April 4, possibly left a long trace of popcorn and soda spilled in the US cinemas and the United Kingdom, but also encouraged the film industry. The film has officially exceeded the 700 million dollars (MDD) for sale of tickets worldwide, and already became the second highest grossing film based on a video game, after the film by Super Mario Bros. The 2023 film.
But beyond the solid weekend box office resultsA Minecraft movie is also the last sign that Hollywood finally deciphered the formula to convert video games into successful films.
The revenge of the pixels
The idea that video game fans would go mass to see their favorite characters on the big screen He was always convincing in theorybut a series of failures, including the first movie of Super Mario Bros in 1993, demonstrated otherwise. “There was a time when video game films simply did not work”Says an executive of a study that has succeeded with video game films. “They were bad movies, Chafa movies.”
Recent successes, Including a trio of Sonic The Hedgehog’s films, Five Nights at Freddy’s And a second attempt from a Super Mario -based film In 2023, They give the studies the hope that Video games could provide a rich vein of intellectual property Without exploiting to develop, just at the moment when Marvel comics franchises seem to run out of gas.
Marvel superhero movies that They dominated the box office in the 2010 They turned out to be less reliable successes In the 2020s. Starting with Iron Man in 2008, Marvel generated 30 thousand MDD at the box office during the next decade, and six of his films of The Avengers (Avengers) were among the 20 highest grossing.
But after some failuresthe general director of Disney, Bob Iger, reduced the number of premieres of Marvel hoping to focus on quality again. For Iger, the turning point apparently was the premiere in 2023 of TONT-MAN and the wasp: Quantumania-a sequel that nobody apparently requested-followed that same year by The Marvels. That movie, also a sequel, won The ignominious distinction of having the worst weekend of the history of history of the study.
“The sequelae used to work well for us,” Iger said at a press conference, before questioning if it was still so. “Do you need a third and a fourth?” He asked.
Last year, the study only premiered a franchise film, Deadpool & Wolverinea sequel that raised 1,300 million pesos.
DC Studios, owned by Warner Bros, has also had complicated years With failures like the musical Joker: Folie à Deux last year. The study has a lot at play with Supermanthat will be released in July.
Now, some believe that The studies will become more aggressive at the time of Extract success ideas of success to turn them into cinematographic franchises. “In the last 20 years Marvel And other comics were the basis of our films, “continues the executive.” I think LThe video games are replacing comics as the next border of intellectual property to explore. ”
After being criticized, rightly, for their low quality, Some video game -based productions begin to match The ambition and mastery of some category and film category productions, says Robert, media professor at the University of Syracuse. Appointment The Last of Us HBO, based on the homonymous video game, and Fallout from Amazon Prime.
“Both (series) were taken very seriously by critics,” he says. “This coincides with the moment when the video game is being seriously considered an independent art form, with its own narrative possibilities as a means.”
The data
More than 700 MDD has raised
A minecraft movie at the box office worldwide, which makes it a financial success.
For Shuji Ussumi, president and executive director of SEGA AMERICA AND EUROPEthe video game creator, This moment was seen coming for a long time. Remember to be disdained by Hollywood executives when you made a brief presentation for a film based on a video game in the 1990s. “They treated me as if we were a toy company”remember. But now you have no problem organizing a presentation board.
“We are talking with many people from Hollywood,” says Ussumi to FT. “They understand that Now video games are more important than music and that the movies. Video games are becoming culture. ”
The Minecraft movie chickn jockey
A Minecraft movie It certainly seems that touched a cultural sensitive fiber. Like the phenomenon Barbenheimer of 2023, where online memes fed an unusual cross pollination of interest both in Barbie as in Oppenheimerthe videos of Tiktok generated by users made a Minecraft movie in An event that fans feel they should live in a crowded cinema.
The concert movie The Eras Tour Taylor Swift of 2023 also became something that fans wanted to see on a large screen in the company of others Swiftiesand resulted in The highest grossing concert film of all time.
The data
200 million monthly users
It has the Minecraft video game.
The key to success of Minecraft or other videogame -based films, says the veteran executive of the study, is he Fan Service, pay attention to the details that attracted the audience In the beginning and resist the temptation to force the conventions of a traditional film. “The more precise you can do it based on the characters and the game environment, and the attention to detail, that is what the public really rewards,” he says.
Jesse Ehrman, president of Development and Production of Warner Bros, producer of A Minecraft movie he says that the film is perfect for a “Digital strategy focused on fans”In Tiktok, Instagram and other social media platforms.
“You have to create and do something that fans really welcome, give them the tools and empower them,” he adds. “You have to feel organic.”
The data
150 MDD was the cost of production
Of a Minecraft movie.
The now famous Tiktok video Chickn Jockeywhich fed chaos in the projections of A Minecraft movieusers generated it, It was not the product of the Warner Bros marketing department. Video game fans Minecraft They know that seeing a Chickn Jockey –A zombie baby mounted on the back of a chicken – it is an extremely rare event that could justify some kind of celebration.
“I would lie if I said that he knew that (the Chickn Jockey) It would be something important, but it was something we talk about, “says Ehrman.” You can’t explain emerging behavior or things that connect with people. Only It seeks to create a film that feels fun and authenticthat influence the interaction and experience of people with the game. And if you are rigorous about it, these things can happen. ”
From the block to the screen
There were times when A Minecraft movie It seemed that it was not going to happen. In 2014, two producers – Roy Lee, co -producer of THE GREAT LEGO ADVENTUREand Jill Messick, whose credits are included Heavy girls– They achieved the rights of Minecraft From the Swedish video game developer Mojang AB and took them to Warner Bros. over the years, the project changed director, Microsoft bought the game and Warner studio itself sold twice. Messick died in 2018, but retains the credits as producer of the film.
Over the years, different ideas arose on how to carry Minecraft to the big screen, something that was not a simple proposal. It’s a game “Sandbox”, Which means that players pursue their own interests and there are no defined objectives or arguments; a lack of structure that could represent a challenge for screenwriters.
And as the team tried to create the right story, the game became greatly popular. Now It has approximately 200 million monthly users that create their own adventures in a world of blocks where they build structures and collect resources.
TO Minecraft He also lacked characters. In the first versions of the script, the story did not focus on Steve, the generic and predetermined character of the game, played by Black in the film. But everything began to take shape when director Jared HESS, who made Napoleon Dynamite and Nacho Libre With Black, he signed for the film in 2022.
After almost 15 years trying to make a movie MinecraftEhrman says that Warner Bros. ended with “the right equipment, at the right price and at the right time to finally achieve it.”
Now it could be time to start from scratch. The success of A Minecraft movie It almost guarantees that there will be a sequel. “I say, it would be nonsense not to do it,” says Ehrman. “Fans want more, so I hope we can find how to do it.”
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